rob bredow

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Creativity Inc.

A few great quotes from the excellent book by Ed Catmull, Creativity Inc.

“There is nothing quite like ignorance combined with a driving need to succeed to force rapid learning.”

“Believe me, you don’t want to be at a company where there is more candor in the hallways than in the rooms where fundamental ideas or matters of policy are being hashed out.”

“Your employees are smart; that’s why you hired them. So treat them that way. They know when you deliver a message that’s been heavily massaged.”

“Remember, people are more important than ideas.”

I love this quote about managing downside risk with bureaucracy:

“The oversight group had been put in place without anyone asking a fundamental question: How do we enable our people to solve problems? Instead, they asked: How do we prevent our people from screwing up? That approach never encourages a creative response.”

“I’ve noticed what might be called a ‘law of subverting successful approaches,’ by which I mean once you’ve hit on something that works, don’t expect it to work again, because attendees will know how to manipulate it the second time around.”

On data:

“Measure what you can, evaluate what you measure, and appreciate that you cannot measure the vast majority of what you do. And at least every once in a while, make time to take a step back and think about what you are doing.”

And finally, a warning not to try to make too much out of clever quotes without living the background story: